


Gimme Shelter

by thealexandriaarchives



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Abusive Relationship, Angst, Dean is a piece of shit but we all knew that, Fluffy Ending, Gen, Homophobia, Pre-Canon, backstory fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-26
Updated: 2015-02-26
Packaged: 2018-03-15 07:52:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3439406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thealexandriaarchives/pseuds/thealexandriaarchives
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She told him about some of the guys she was dating, but she never brought any of them home until Dean. He brought presents, and groceries, and she smiled around him like she hadn't for years, and Eggsy decided then that he liked him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gimme Shelter

Eggsy didn’t go back to school after Christmas hols that year. His mum called it an extra-special holiday, talking about how much fun it was not to have to go to school in the morning, and get to stay home and watch cartoons all day.

It didn’t feel like a holiday though, with mum sitting on the sofa behind him, watching him more often than the screen, cigarette burning down untouched between her fingers before being replaced.

Eggsy liked school.

He liked learning about the countries his dad had sent him pictures from, and the people who lived there.

He liked running around the playground at lunchtime, climbing the monkey bars and making too much noise without being yelled at to quiet down.

He liked the tiny library with the mean old man who glared at kids with sticky hands and helped him pick out adventure stories.

He didn’t like staying in the flat all day, only bundling up and leaving for the corner shop for more ciggies, wine and Coco Pops.

But mum looked got upset whenever he asked when he could go back, and she was upset too often these days anyway, so he sat on the floor in front of the sofa, stubbing out her cigarettes when she fell asleep, and playing with the medal in his pocket the man in the suit had given him for Christmas.

A month later another man knocked on the door and talked to his mum for a long time. He went back to school after that, but it wasn’t the same one.

-

They changed flats too, and his mum got a job answering phones in an office that did something with concrete.

She had to work until late, so a lady at the new school asked him to pick a club or team to join after school. He chose gymnastics, and she gave him a strange look when she handed him the paper for his mum to sign, but didn’t say anything.

There were fifteen people on the gymnastics team, and Eggsy was the only boy except for one.

Jimmy Prendell was shorter than all the girls, with a mop of blond hair and gap-toothed grin. He wore a purple leotard and told Eggsy on his first day that he was going to be an Olympic ribbon dancer.

After a couple weeks Eggsy noticed Jimmy’s missing tooth wasn’t coming in, and he missed practice for days at a time.

Eggsy started walking Jimmy to and from the bus stop every day.

His mum went mental when she saw the bruises he brought home from practice, but he promised they’d go away when he got better.

He brought home another medal a year later, and this one made her smile.

-

The concrete building closed down, and his mum had a hard time finding a new job. Eggsy told her it was okay if they needed to move again, and she smiled like was trying not to cry.

She went out every day looking for work.

Then she started going out every night.

She would be there to greet him from practice every day, make him dinner and ask him all about his new routine. Then she would help him with his homework, and tuck him into bed. Mrs. Gupta next door would check in on him sometimes.

“You know what to do if there’s trouble?” She’d always ask.

Eggsy would nod, and recite the emergency phone number he’d had memorized for years.

“Good boy. Don’t ever dial 999 instead. I’ll be home in the morning to make your breakfast.”

-

She told him about some of the guys she was dating, but she never brought any of them home until Dean.

He came over for the first time for Saturday dinner, and brought a pile of presents. Sweets for Eggsy, groceries for the fridge, even one of those new DVD players he’d heard about at school.

It came with three movies in languages Eggsy didn’t know, and there were no words on the discs, but they were martial arts movies and he watched them until they started skipping and wouldn’t play any more.

Dean told bad jokes and others ones Eggsy didn’t understand, didn’t ask about school, and let him win at arm wrestling. Mum smiled in the corner like she hadn’t for years, and Eggsy decided he liked him.

At the end of the night he pulled out another box, and mum pulled out a fur coat like Eggsy had only seen in one of the old black and white films they had shown at school. He put it on her shoulders and she spun and laughed while Eggsy clapped and Bruce Lee beat up mobsters on the screen.

-

Dean sees Eggsy practicing flips for a meet one night in the living room.

He pulls Eggsy aside and has him practicing the magic tricks he’s been teaching him recently, using slight of hand to make battered playing cards disappear up sleeves and re-appear in other people’s pockets instead.

Eggsy hears yelling from his mum’s room that night, and the next morning, she makes his breakfast a little more gingerly than usually, and leans against the sink watching him eat it. She stares at a spot just behind his left ear, sucks determinedly on her cigarette, and brings up the idea of him quitting Gymnastics for a paper route.

He never gets the route, but he quits the team after the third time she asks, limping slightly and rubbing thoughtlessly at a darkening bruise on her upper arm.

-

Boxes and presents still pile up around the flat, but they stay in the packaging, vanishing weeks or months later.

The fur coat disappears halfway through the winter.

The DVD player disappears along with 17 other identical ones a year later.

-

He’s 14 when Dean declares it’s time he had a fucking drink with him and met the rest of his boys,  and drags him to a pub where no one behind the counter meets his eye, let alone checks his ID.

Half a dozen blokes look up from their drinks to greet Dean and eye him over, sitting up a little straighter when Dean introduces him as ‘his Eggsy’, and throwing varying welcomes and offers of drinks his way.

Dean pulls him aside after his third lager and throws an arm around his shoulder, doing nothing to steady his already uneven stance.

“They’re aight lads, but they’ve got th’ brains of a fuckin’ guppy between ‘em all. Not you like you, Eggsy.”

His vision swims as he’s trying to figure out what Dean’s saying.

His stepfather laughs and slaps him on the back.

“It’s good, innit? You and me, m’boy, we’re gonna be goin’ places.”

Eggsy’s sick in the back alley.

-

Jimmy Prendell is found with the rest of his teeth smashed in on the corner of Smith street when Eggsy’s 16.

Dean smirks as he’s the one who tells him.

-

The day he turns 18 he enlists with the Marines. His mum cries silently in the corner, while Dean shouts at him about wasting his fucking potential to be bitch to Queen and country.

Eggsy tells him to fuck off, and it’s the first time Dean ever hits him.

He can barely move the next morning, but he doesn’t let it show.

His mum begs him not to go, nearly hysterical.

Dean tells him he’ll wash out in a week and won’t be able to come back.

The instructors tell him his scores are good enough to train for any kind of specialist or officer track he wants after basic training.

With a week left to go he gets a phone call from his mum.

The nurse at the hospital tells him the broken zygomatic bone and the fractured wrist are the most noticeable injuries, but internal bleeding is what they’re really worried about.

Four men swear they saw her fall down the council flat steps. Three more were with Dean in the pub at the time.

Eggsy quits and stays at the hospital until she’s released.

Dean sends a bunch of daisies from the garage.

-

He stays, and keeps his head down and his mouth mostly shut.

She defends him every time the rent gets paid  _(late)_  or he takes her out to meet some of his business associates  _(pricks)_.

She can't look him in the eye every time she gets a black eye or winces as she does her hair. 

_"He's not so bad usually Eggsy, really, I wish you'd just get on."_

He convinces her to leave him, well and truly, a couple of times. 

The time he gets the closest she starts packing in secret at night, saving up the money along with Eggsy to get away.

She figures out she's pregnant the next week.

-

He snaps first, and it ends in a car chase and a bar brawl and butcher knife while his mother begs for his life, and then it's over, and he's out, and it's probably definitely the best thing that's ever happened to him except they're both still  _there_  even while he's here. 

But he can't think about that now.

-

He's been a Kingsman officially for three months now, and he's only slept at home probably a total of about a month. 

Mum doesn't ask, too grateful for the unbelievable miracle that's happened, doesn't ask in the same way she didn't ask about the DVD players and the fur coats and their mysterious comings and goings.

She still jumps when she hears the door or her new mobile, but she smiles at Sophie and Eggsy more often, and drinks and smokes less. It's a start.

One night he makes it home in time for dinner, and while they eat in silence for most of the meal, she looks up out of the blue and tells him she's proud of him.

"And you are... happy, as a tailor, aren't you Eggsy?"

He stares at her in shock for a minute, trying to find the words to speak.

"Yeah, mum. Of course I am."

She nods, eyes falling back to her plate quickly. 

"Good. That's good then."

-

One of the Kingsmen's actual tailors trains him in the basic techniques, and takes over for some of the more complicated parts. 

Lancelot helps with women's fashion tips on what she thinks would suit Michelle best.

The new Merlin who was Amelia-From-Tech helps with some of the bells and whistles, and Arthur-that-was-Merlin authorized the release of some obscenely expensive materials.

It's a simple black peacoat, but it's probably worth more than half a dozen fur coats combined.

The wool blend is bulletproof, water and stab-resistant. A GPS micro-tracker is sewn into the lining, a panic button on the left sleeve, and a miniaturized can of Kingsman mace in the right. It's perfectly tailored to his mum's measurements, and he only ruined about 5 trying to get the stitching right.

He helps her into it, as Sophie watches, clapping cheerfully at whatever holds her attention.

"Merry Christmas, mum."

**Author's Note:**

> Oh God my first fic in forever was just going to be Hartwin porn but instead I get THIS. Oh well. Lemme know how on or off the mark you think I am. This fandom desperately needs headcanons.


End file.
